One thing that will be required of you when you are in a leader role is the ability to give constructive criticism, not a destructive one. Not only destructive can lose your team’s morale, people tends to lose respect for you too! More often than not destructive criticism is a result of bad communication skills, thus no amount of good intention can save you from appearing the wrong way.
Constructive criticism, when given correctly can have the positive effect of a boost in productivity as well as output, and on the other hand negative one will do nothing for your workforce, expect to strut your ego perhaps.
The below tips can get you started on how to give positive and meaningful message across properly:
Downplay The Criticism – This is a very good way to get your message across, while not appearing too harsh. You can start by saying something positive, and ending it with a compliment. Your criticism should come somewhere in the middle, because of primacy and recency effect, it can comes down as less harsh than it would normally sound. Be sure that you’re commenting on the matter, and never go beyond the boundaries by going personal.
Know when to be direct – Depending on the situation, you might need to stop beating around the bush and approach your staff directly, especially in a situation where the reputation and good standards of your company are involved. Knowing when to be direct can make sure that you get your views across as intended just be sure that you also offer them a solution and not leave it for them to figure it out, as most of them would not be able to. You also want to strive to understand why they did what they did and help correct their mistakes, instead of just punishing them.
Repeating Yourself – There is simply no point in doing that because if you’re doing it over and over again in a short period of time will not yield you any form of positive results. Give your staff time and room to change before you remind them again, encouraging is better than repeating and thus you should practice this.
Doing it privately – Nobody likes to be embarrassed, you do not like it and your staff would not prefer you to do it in front of others too! Respect that and giving your comments in private can help with the productivity and loyalty of your staff, you’ll also get the respect from them that way.
Lastly, be specific about the problems and the solution that you’re offering, many times vague message leaves them half hanging and have no idea on how to improve on the current situation.
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